Tee-Nut

It really means having a business that provides a wage, but the business do es not make any money above the amount to pay the owners wages and pay on the capital invested.

Owning a business is having a business that makes money over and above just getting by.

In my case I worked with a guy building houses, but he did not really want to grow. He talked of growing the business, but really just wanted to buil d one house at a time and have a job where he could control everything. He went bankrupt. I lost money.

The other one was a guy making fishing rod blanks. He interviewed my son a nd was going to hire him, but the Sunday evening before the Monday when my son was to start work, he called me and asked me to break the news to my so n that he had changed his mind. He never employed anyone other than his wif e. He had a government pension and just wanted to have job where he did n ot have any pressure.

Tee Nut on the other hand bought a machine shop, bought some up to date ma chines, and was developing a rifle as a product. He was working at having a machine shop , but not a shop where he worked as a machinist.

Dan

Reply to
dcaster
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From an investment standpoint, it's sometimes called "buying yourself a job."

Reply to
Ed Huntress

Awesome! That's me, I just want to own my job... not possible.

George H.

Reply to
ggherold

Thanks - that makes sense. The idea that the Tubal Cain videos were Tee Nut's did not.

Bob

Reply to
Bob Engelhardt

Yes. And the question was -> what's wrong with that?

Even if the only employee is the owner it still counts as a business as far as the law is concerned.

Are you saying that making money off of the labor of someone else should be regarded as morally superior to making money exclusively off your own labor?

Reply to
jim

Not superior at all, but don't ask for an 'investment' and then give the potential investor a blank look when asked how they get their money back..

--sp

Reply to
Spehro Pefhany

i don't know what that has to do with anything, but perhaps there was a misunderstanding and what was being asked for was charitable donation.

Reply to
jim

It certainly shouldn't be regarded as "exploitation", that's for sure.

Assuming the business is viable, the business owner and the employee both benefit from the employer/employee relationship. This goes without saying.

Reply to
Rudy Canoza

Businesses employ people. They pay for the labor , capital machinery, raw materials, etc. So while you can say they make money off the labor of some one else, you could say the same thing about raw material or say machine to ols. Or you could say people make money off the effort businesses do in pl anning , implementing , selling , etc.

I am saying that there is a difference between owning your job and having a business.

Owning your job is very close to working for someone. And typically those businesses do not grow and do not create jobs.

I am not saying one is morally better. But if you understand what you are dealing with it makes things run smoother. The house company was in Alabam a. We made panellized houses and sold them in Alabama, Georgia, Florida, a nd Tennessee. If we had serious about making money we would have relocated to Northern Calif for a building location and sold into Southern Calif. W e would have made a pile of money. Instead when I realized it was more or loss a hobby business, I left . John got an idea to build houses to sell t o single folks and put them near down town Huntsville. On houses built out in the boondocks , we had a real advantage. We would load up a semi trail er , take it most anywhere and put up a house. No trips to town to get any thing. But in down town Huntville a builder could hire sub contractors for every aspect of the construction and while we were not less able, we had n o advantage. He went broke.

On the fishing rod blanks, I got the names and addresses of a lot of sporti ng goods stores in New Zealand and think we could have increased our sales significantly. But it was wasted effort. Ron had no interest in increasi ng sales and never contacted anyone in New Zealand. I quit trying to help the business, Mostly because he did not pay me anything for the machine sh op work I did. Ron kept building fishing rod blanks until he decided to re tire. He sold the business to someone in the Philly area, but I do not fin d any fishing rod blank business around there.

Dan

Reply to
dcaster

On 01/14/2016 1:02 PM, snipped-for-privacy@krl.org wrote: ...

...

Reply to
dpb

No that's false. According to the SBA 79.9% of the businesses in the US have no hired employees.

What difference?

In recent years the self employed have been the businesses that created the most jobs and the most growth. In fact they are just about the only businesses model where there has been positive job growth. The net creation of jobs by large businesses has been negative. Even in good times big business has rarely seen net positive increase in jobs in the last 40 years. Much of small businesses job creation is due to sole proprietorships evolving into small employer businesses. .

You've said a lot of things that are simply false.

if you understand.....

Reply to
jim

have been involved with several people who talked about having a business, but really just wanted to own their job.

I guess, then, that I have been paying all these business taxes for nothing all these years.

I have fought tooth & nail to keep my business small for the past 32 years. I have turned down large & meaty jobs and offers of partnerships & buyouts . OTOH, my house is paid for, I owe no debts. I have money in the bank. I d on't buy what I can't pay for in cash. This drives bankers crazy.

Twice, over the years, I have had employees. The stress was simply not wort h it to me. Every piece of work that goes out of here has my name and reput ation on it, and I'll be damned if someone else is going to screw that up. So now, I use part-time help and contractors when I need them, and you can bet I go over every bit of the work they do. And my customers are overjoyed .

Reply to
rangerssuck

le you can say they make money off the labor of someone else, you could say the same thing about raw material or say machine tools. Or you could say people make money off the effort businesses do in planning , implementing , selling , etc.

ng a business.

What Dan doesn't seem to get is that the self-employed work their butts off to be ... employed. I know a LOT of people who have been laid off from the ir jobs at "businesses." Not me. I do pay unemployment tax on my salary, bu t for the life of me, I can't imagine how I'd ever collect on it. I've watc hed plenty of other companies fall by the wayside while I've just chugged a long in my little shop - contracting for big customers and small ones, alwa ys paying my bills on time.

Reply to
rangerssuck

ff to be ... employed. I know a LOT of people who have been laid off from t heir jobs at "businesses." Not me. I do pay unemployment tax on my salary, but for the life of me, I can't imagine how I'd ever collect on it. I've wa tched plenty of other companies fall by the wayside while I've just chugged along in my little shop - contracting for big customers and small ones, al ways paying my

I do understand that. I have been there and done that. My butt has been w orked hard enough that my pants tend to fall off. I wish I could find Tee Nuts post about businesses versus owning a job. He did much better at expl aining the differences.

Dan

Reply to
dcaster

On 01/15/2016 8:00 AM, snipped-for-privacy@krl.org wrote: ...

Seems to me from the discussion here (but not having seen the original either) it's a philosophical viewpoint rather than an actual one and folks here are confounding the two viewpoints...

$0.02, im(ns)ho, ymmv, etc., etc., etc., ...

Reply to
dpb

It is a philosophical viewpoint , but it ends up affecting the actual decisions about the business.

Dan

Reply to
dcaster

The average sole proprietorship in the US has invested $30,000 in his or her business. The average *profitable* sole proprietorship returns $14,000/yr. to its owner (just over $11,000 to the average sole proprietorship, including those that are not profitable).

That's buying yourself a very low-paying job. And the money they've bought it with usually is borrowed.

These figures come from the Small Business Administration.

Reply to
Ed Huntress

On 01/15/2016 1:00 PM, Ed Huntress wrote: ...

I'm sure there's no way to winnow out the deliberate "loss-leader" hobby "businesses" from those statistics but I strongly suspect they skew them drastically for folks actually making a living off theirs.

Also wonder how many are franchisees of some outfit? That's a pretty sure way to give somebody else the money, too...

Reply to
dpb

Another likely distortion in the numbers is the fact that once a sole proprietorship starts making money there are incentives to operate instead as an S-corp. I've "owned my jobs" for 35 years and have operated as a sole proprietorship for only short periods of time at the beginnings of new ventures.

Reply to
Ned Simmons

I am not having much luck searching for the post in question among the

2300+ pages of postings I have on file, 1998 - 2001
Reply to
geraldrmiller

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